Al-Qaeda stronger thanks to Mush deal: US intel

With the Pakistani security forces staying out of the region, al-Qaida militants were able to resettle and even re-establish some training camps in the area, says Michael Leiter, acting director of the National Counter terrorism Center.

"I think that safe haven has made al-Qaida stronger today than it was two years ago," Leiter told the National Public Radio in an interview on Monday. "That has allowed it to recruit, train, and deploy individuals in plots against Western Europe and potentially the homeland or, the United States," he said.

The US National Intelligence Director Michael McConnell shares the assessment and agrees that having survived the global war on terror, al-Qaida is again a centrally directed network with military capabilities.

"They have the leadership that they had before, they've rebuilt the middle management, the trainers," McConnell told the CNN recently, adding "And they're recruiting very vigorously." Before 2006, al-Qaida was arguably on the run, under attack, its mid-level leadership decimated. Osama bin Laden and his associates were still able to inspire Islamic militant groups in Africa and the Middle East - but they could not direct them.

The assessment is in complete contrast with the opinion of the US President George W Bush, who last month told a conservative conference "The Taliban, al-Qaida and their allies are on the run." Army Maj Reid Sawyer, of West Point's Combating Terrorism Center, agrees with the intelligence agencies and says al-Qaida's central leadership, securely based in Pakistan, is once again taking charge.

"What we have been observing is al-Qaida's attempt to re-assert control throughout their disparate networks, with al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, in the Horn of Africa, to provide guidance and mentoring, as well as some funding to these organizations," Sawyer said.

"So the organization has coalesced again, because of its ability to have sanctuary. And that's really given it such a benefit that can't be overstated," he added.